GameSpy: The 10 Most Irrational Videogame Endings (original) (raw)

By Evan Hoovler | Jul 9, 2010

After the final boss goes down, these games go crazy.

Story-driven videogames represent a constant struggle between the game's player and its writer/designer. The player often wants to do things that are outside of the script's boundaries (like killing innocents), so the writer must take steps to bring them back in line without being totally obvious (like killing the gamer).

Sometimes, however, the game's writer throws a cheap shot-to-the-junk after the bell has rung. I'm talking about endings that take the characters in new and horrible directions, completely out of the player's control. We've called out 10 classic games for taking the storyline to a final twist which spits in the face of everything we've come to expect.

10. Assassin's Creed 2

The Plot:

Using science, you relive the thrilling exploits of a 15th-Century Italian assassin.

Then the Game Ends, and It Turns Out...

An ancient race of super-beings have manipulated nearly every major event in human history to stop an apocalypse.

So, ancient beings created humans as a slave race. Then a giant war broke out. During the middle of this war, a massive solar flare destroyed almost all life on Earth, presumably while Slayer was rocking out in the background. Before their race fully perished, the Ancients created ways for you, the player, to prevent this. These ways all involve running around throwing knives at the Pope and his men, apparently.

The "matrix outside the assassin's mind" plot line has always run through the Assassin's Creed series, like the juicy black line of feces runs over a succulent shrimp. If there's anything that doesn't need spicing up with a mysterious back story, it's knife-fighting. This would be akin to Ms. Pac-Man having a cut-scene which revealed that Ms. Pac-Man was a genetic experiment run wild, and the ghosts were of the Super Scientists who formed her. Simply unnecessary.

9. Mega Man 2

The Plot:

You are a

robot

, battling the animatronic henchmen of the nefarious Dr. Wily.

Then the Game Ends, and It Turns Out...

Mega Man is a lot deeper than his circuited interior would imply. He takes a pensive walk through the seasons (all four of them - now that's pensive!). He gazes home, realizing... something emotional. Having finished with whatever baffling character evolution he's just undergone, Mega Man leaves his helmet above the hills of a hometown. Might this be Mega Man's hometown? Of course not, he's a robot. What the hell is going on, here, exactly?

8. Eternal Sonata

The Plot:

On his deathbed, classical musician Chopin has a dream which is really a JRPG.

Then the Game Ends, and It Turns Out...

I've been playing a game for two-year-olds.

No list of baffling endings would be complete without the 50+ minute schmaltz-fest that follows Eternal Sonata. Then again, no game has managed to combine the pain of real death with educational quotes for/from autistic four-year olds ("Something that people think is useful but can actually be harmful in the long run? Maybe if you think for a while, you can come up with some things that I don't know about.")

First of all, Chopin dies. The writers use this as an excuse to forego concluding the stories of almost every character. Apparently, since they only existed in Chopin's mind, screw you for caring about them. Then, the game rolls credits twice, while the characters proceed to assail the player's maturity level for half an hour ("Of course, the bread you're eating is more important than the bread of a stranger. Huh? Or, wait, how is it any different?") The whole thing is capped off with a short cartoon fable about a snail which has absolutely zero relation to the story, or reality. The whole thing comes off like an unrehearsed puppet show put on by a child. The embarrassment comes in realizing that whomever wrote this was a (chronologically) full-grown adult.

7. Quest for Glory 3

The Plot:

Battle a demon wizard in a jungle.

Then the Game Ends, and It Turns Out...

The game doesn't end.

The end to this game is what designers call an "open ending," and what gamers call "absolute crap." At the end of Quest for Glory III, the villain comes out on top and curses your player with an evil spell. Game over, darkness wins, see ya!

This would've been acceptable if there was any plan to continue the story, but there clearly wasn't. Quest for Glory III was in itself a divergence from the "four seasons" storytelling approach used in I, II, IV, and V. So, the makers decided to take a freaking sidequest, and turn it into a full-fledged $40 game with no resolution, whatsoever.